The Cyber Gods of Infotainment


this may or may not be blogger donkeytale
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[editors note: While the Soc-donk Autopilot II is offline celebrating its most recent victorious punking of yet another infantile leftist blog (confirmed by its recent twin banning by white middle class third party progressive cult leader Jane Hamsher) we have decided to re-post one of the beloved bot's earlier most prescient works, compleat with comment thread first published December 11, 2010. This from a blog that shall remain nameless]

Of course, nothing shockingly revelatory, nor really even mildly interesting, has been obtained from the leaks themselves. Primarily, these are low level diplomatic communiques, and as anyone who has even a passing acquaintance with British cold war spy literature knows, diplomats aren't ever privvy to the real games of international intrigue which lie beneath the public surface.

Julian Assange is now a hero, and rightfully so, as he battles with the hostile forces of world governments, particularly the US, in an unprecedented public relations media war over freedom of speech, freedom of the internet, and freedom of the press.  
Complete transparency of the public sphere will someday receive a court hearing, but it isn't at all clear that one will happen around Assange or WikiLeaks. There is too much to lose on both sides to bring this thing to court, IMHO.
The court martial of the pitiable Bradley Manning will surely be used to warn off future leakers who work for the goverment and hold security clearances. Manning is the man who suffers from this affair, and unfortunately, has really only himself to blame for his outing and subsequent arrest. In fact, the very same can be said for the self-described James Bond of journalism, who blamed two of his "fans" for his legal problem in Sweden.

The lesson that every blogger already knows: never trust anybody you meet on the internet.

There has been much sabre rattling rhetoric from an embarrassed US Government, some coerced corporate backlash against WikiLeaks and a sustained, rather weak but of course well-hyped retaliation of sorts by the teenaged "revolutionaries" of 4chan, whose computer game tactics have generated lots of heat, disavowal from Assange, and have had little to no effect on the commerce of its targets.

So far, the corporations seem to be winning this cyber-battle, which is still interesting and maybe even possibly game changing, nonetheless. 4chan and affiliated sites have actually suffered more downtime than the sites they have attacked. None of the credit cards have experienced any actual loss or slowing of their processing businesses. But, 4chan is not done yet and are disseminating their DDoS software to more people every day, who are joining in the game. The size of the game matters more than the results. Which side you are on matters, too. I am backing the kids, because, after all, the children are the future.

To date, the US Government has not sought an indictment, despite heavily publicised breathless rumours by Assange's legal team to the contrary, nor had they taken any legal action at all to suppress WikiLeak's release of the cables or previous disclosures. They have announced that they are looking into avenues for prosecution, but as Greenwald and many others have pointed out, there seems to be zero legal basis for such action.
For his hesitation, President Obama will face the vituperation of the Republicans in time, unless he wilts pre-emptively, as is his style, and his AG finds some bogus grounds on which to indict Assange, either for espionage or conspiracy to steal secret government documents. The espionage gambit seems almost laughable, and conspiracy would require evidence that Assange materially aided and encouraged Bradley Manning's leaking activities.

Julian Assange, it should be fairly noted, has created a new media business model that is likely to be copied and spread, regardless of his personal fate. He has demonstrated a wide range of courage, intelligence, egomania, as well as stupidity. He has and will continue to gain fame and fortune from his activities, even in the very unlikely event that he ends up behind bars for the leaks.

As with most entrepreneurs, however, he will likely not be the one to maximize the success of his creation. That will probably come later, in subsequent iterations of the new form. One such, OpenLeaks.com, started by former WikiLeaks staffers who became disenchanted with Assanges hubris and moved on, opens for business on Monday. This is a modified model that likely has a better chance for longterm sustainability: acting solely as a clearinghouse between the leakers and the media. Assange's model is to be the media and the front man, a sort of cult of personality. The leakers lose all control over their efforts once Assange takes over the process with the media, although as we have seen, it is leakers who bear the brunt of the legal burden. OpenLeaks promises to be different. Time will tell.

Like most truly creative people, Assange has both soared the heights and scoured the depths, and in the age of the infoboobtubes, has done so in a remarkably short span of time.

Without a doubt, Julian Assange is the historic troll.

His coming legal challenges, if he has any, will be landmark international media events without precedent. Will the internet remain free? Is it free now? Will the piracy of the anonymous groups lead to a severe conservative backlash like occurred in reaction to the activism of the 1960s/70s New Left?

Julian Assange is a transcendent celebrity, trending hotter than the Texas sun in August. Indictments will only increase and extend his worldwide stature. Conviction seems impossible without publicly railroading him, which in turn would make him a worldwide martyr on the level of a cyber-Mandela.

The very first virgin sacrifice offered to the cyber Gods of infotainment.

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Remember Bradley Manning in your breathless praise for Julian Assange (4.00 / 2)

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The Revolution Will NOT be Cybertized (0.00 / 0)

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Bloggaz are Scared of Revolution (0.00 / 0)

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US Govt also starting to leak.....that it hasnt any case against Assange (0.00 / 0)
http://www.sltrib.com/sltrib/w...
Even as some government officials contend that the release of thousands of classified documents by WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange jeopardizes U.S. national security, legal experts, Pentagon officials and Justice Department lawyers concede any effort to prosecute him faces numerous hurdles.Among them: Prosecutors apparently have had difficulty finding evidence that Assange ever communicated directly with Army Pfc. Bradley Manning, 23, an intelligence specialist who's widely thought to be the source of the documents, but is charged only with misusing and illegally downloading them.
Bradley Manning, bless his soul, who no doubt is being tempted with lots of favours to squeal on Assange as Adrian Lamo did on him, isnt cooperating.

Prosecutors declined to discuss what evidence they have in the Manning case, but three Pentagon officials who cautioned that their information is two months old recently told McClatchy Newspapers that as of that time prosecutors had no evidence tying Manning to Assange.The prosecution is now working under the theory that Manning, who was arrested in May in Iraq and is being held at the Marine Corps base at Quantico, Va., provided the information to an unnamed third party who then passed the information to WikiLeaks, according to the officials, who agreed to speak only on the condition of anonymity because the case is still under investigation.
Manning, who faces as many as 54 years in prison on 10 charges, isn't cooperating with prosecutors, the officials said. His attorney, Maj. Thomas Hurley, didn't answer numerous calls seeking comment.
In addition, any potential Assange prosecution on charges that he intentionally threatened U.S. national security would be complicated because top national security leaders disagree about how damaging the leaks have been. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said the release could put lives in danger, but Secretary of Defense Robert Gates called the reaction "overwrought" in a briefing with reporters.
Also unclear is what law would apply. The Justice Department would most likely charge Assange under one of two laws - the Espionage Act of 1917 or theft of government property, former prosecutors and experts agree.
Either charge would be the first of its kind, however.

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Swedish leftists throwing cold water over the honey pot theory (0.00 / 0)
In court last week Assange was alleged to have had sex with unlawful coercion with a woman who was asleep and to have sexually molested the other by having sex without a condom.In Sweden, among the country's community of hackers and left-leaning political activists, the timing is viewed as coincidental rather than conspiratorial.
"The Americans are very lucky indeed that Assange screwed around in Sweden, a society which takes rape allegations very seriously,'' said Åsa Linderborg, culture editor of the leftwing Aftonbladet tabloid. Film-maker Bosse Lindquist, whose WikiLeaks investigation will be broadcast on Swedish TV tonight, and who has spent many hours with Assange over the past few months, said Assange's attitude to women did not seem in any way striking.
"If you look at the two prosecutors involved in investigating the rape allegations, they are not types you would imagine bowing to any kind of pressure from, say, the Swedish government or the United States.''
A senior civil servant, who requested anonymity, also dismissed allegations of political plotting against Assange, arguing that Swedish culture is often misunderstood. "Swedes do not have an iconoclastic tradition in which you build people up then demolish their reputations. Even when people are celebrities, we accept that they may have questionable private lives. Swedes are capable of seeing the advantages of WikiLeaks while conceding that Assange may have unsavoury morals between the sheets.''
Linderborg, though, says there is a widespread sense in Sweden that Assange's rise to fame fuelled his libido and ego.
"Plenty of women are attracted by his underdog status and the supposed danger of spending time with him. He has several women on the go at once. One person told me he screws more often than he eats,'' Linderborg said.
Of course, given the nature of the web, the allegations have triggered a series of attacks on both women's characters with lurid claims of "women who cry rape" and "bitches trying to send an innocent man to prison".
http://www.guardian.co.uk/medi...
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The Revolution will NOT be Cybertized, Part II (0.00 / 0)
http://www.publicaffairsbooks....
In this spirited book, journalist and social commentator Evgeny Morozov shows that by falling for the supposedly democratizing nature of the Internet, Western do-gooders may have missed how it also entrenches dictators, threatens dissidents, and makes it harder-not easier-to promote democracy. Buzzwords like "21st-century statecraft" sound good in PowerPoint presentations, but the reality is that "digital diplomacy" requires just as much oversight and consideration as any other kind of diplomacy.Marshaling compelling evidence, Morozov shows why we must stop thinking of the Internet and social media as inherently liberating and why ambitious and seemingly noble initiatives like the promotion of "Internet freedom" might have disastrous implications for the future of democracy as a whole.

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Really, How Can We Take This Seriously? (4.00 / 1)
This Wikileaks operation is riddled with red flags and loose ends. I am surprised that anyone takes it seriously at all. Most here know of my article:Is Wikileaks Inciting A War With Iran?
You should also read (in a truly great blog):
American Everyman -- If We Lose our Internet Freedoms Because of Wikileaks, You Should At Least Know Why
After reading these articles, I would think an intelligent person would assess a 99% degree of likeliness that Wikileaks must be one of the biggest Internet disinfo operations ever.
Also -- Assange did not invent the Internet info leaks concept at all -- he simply copied it from John Young of Cryptome.org (whom he "worked with" until Young could no longer tolerate his flakiness). See:
Cryptome.org
There is also my newer article:
The Incredible High Strangeness Of Julian Assange
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Right. Assange invented the market for leaks. Thats his creation. Bradley Manning is his key asset (and he's not been paid a cent!) (0.00 / 0)

Just as Bill Gates invented nothing except a marketing concept, Assange is a marketing man, and a damn good one. If you saw his interview in Forbes you see very clearly that he is a capitalist idealist, or a libertarian, if you will. He says thats what he is. And he sells the concept and the WikiLeaks brand incessantly just like any good CEO would do. He's imperious, monomaniacal and twisted in many ways, and I mean that with all due respect. Many, maybe most of the extremely creative businessmen I have know fit this exact same mold.

Now, its not a contradiction at all for Assange to be both a businessman and an internet idealist pursuing "freedom of information and transparency".

Believing Assange is CIA, whether its true or not, is a symbolic way of acknowledging that Assange is an impure human being with very mixed motives and message. He's clearly brilliant and courageous, and completely unhinged by the experience.

I say lets acknowledge the complexity of the situation and the man instead of turning him into a cardboard superhero, which is what the fake left is doing.

Once he becomes a martyr, then he has earned his superhero stripes, before then lets keep our wits about us, alls Im sayin....

by: donkeytale @ Tue Dec 14, 2010 at 04:24:07 AM UTC
[ Parent ]

What An Astounding Pile Of Bullshit (4.00 / 1)
Believing Assange is CIA, whether its true or not, is a symbolic way of acknowledging that Assange is an impure human being with very mixed motives and message. He's clearly brilliant and courageous, and completely unhinged by the experience. - donkeytale
If "Assange is CIA" is merely a question of *symbolic belief*? Disingenuity raised to the level of insanity here. The above comment is 100% pure bullshit.

Who really stands to gain with this Wikileaks fiasco?
//////////

1) Leaking government secrets wholesale is a great way to pass draconian laws restricting free speech on the Internet.

2) It also is a great way to finger participants who could be excluded from employment by and access to establishment institutions in the future.

3) Selective leaks can be used to discredit potential adversaries - such as the leaders of Italy, Turkey, and Russia, who have built a gas pipeline that is beyond the reach of the Western energy monopoly.

4) When financial institutions such as giant banks become embroiled in scandals due to selective "leaks" they are likely to falter or fail, and parties that possess advanced knowledge of the impending leaks will be positioned to receive hundreds of millions of dollars.

5) All significant secret government and corporate data is compartmentalized and encapsulated in a vast multitude of encrypted channels requiring individual passwords, available only on a need-to- know basis. Many channels are physically isolated.

6) Wikileaks cannot even get my passwords, unless it uses illegal keylogging Trojans.
//////////

So Wikileaks must be a huge fraudulent psyop.

by: blues @ Tue Dec 14, 2010 at 11:08:28 AM UTC
[ Parent ]

Your logic doesn't flow (3.00 / 1)

There are some good points in there.

But none of it leads to any proof that Wikileaks is a psyop.

Francis Holland actually had some solid proof when he asked whether Daily Kos is a CIA honey pot or susan something.

You've got nothing but your conspiracy theory freakiness.

What, were you in a LaRouchite or similar group? You post a lot of fucked up ideas. You probably believe there are government sponsored satanic mind control schticks also in operation?

It's like you hit your head hard as a kid or took too many heavy drugs.

Something ain't right with you. It's entertaining. But that is all. And sometimes your rants aren't that entertaining. I'd say you're half-decent for a troll. Nothing special, but nothing too obscene, like one of those supermarket tabloids everyone knows is fiction. Yet you actually believe this stuff? Or maybe you are the psyop?

by: socrates @ Tue Dec 14, 2010 at 21:28:32 PM UTC
[ Parent ]

He's not a psyop (4.00 / 2)

We are psyops.

And you are the type of person who couldn't spell "CIA" unless someone spotted you the C and the I.

And we know who did that too.

by: Cointel Pro @ Tue Dec 14, 2010 at 22:41:07 PM UTC
[ Parent ]

He's A Professional Asshole (4.00 / 1)

Probably from Connecticut, as I am.

by: blues @ Wed Dec 15, 2010 at 00:52:35 AM UTC
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By your "logic" not to mention that of the entire Whiteysphere, (0.00 / 0)

that would make you, him.

I dont believe it.

As everybody already knows, he is me as you are he and we are all fake nooms.

by: donkeytale @ Wed Dec 15, 2010 at 16:34:53 PM UTC
[ Parent ]


Astounding lack of reasoning ability, Blues. (0.00 / 0)

Why am I not suprised?

http://www.theskepticsguide.org/resources/logicalfallacies.aspx

See how many logical fallacies Blues has committed in the above comment?

For extra credit, pick out the number of logical fallacies committed regularly by fairleft.

Winner receives a dinner date with Melvin, courtesy of Miss Devore's underwater Deli by: donkeytale @ Wed Dec 15, 2010 at 16:31:54 PM UTC
[ Parent ]

There Isn't Quite A Smoking Gun, But How Often Do We See Those? (5.00 / 1)

If you just look into the "who benefits" questions, and go into the details I have begun to describe in other posts and comments, the evidence all points in one direction. Show where it doesn't.

One little Army private with a laptop, in Iraq, not even a hacker, Grabs hundreds of thousands of secret State Department communications? Even though such information is largely secret, encrypted, compartmentalized, and never stored in one place? Diplomats do transmit lots of secrets from foreign agents because they can use diplomatic immunity. So how does this little Army guy get to all the data? It's absurd.

If you had real secrets, would you disseminate them through a weird dude with very peculiar platinum hair who spent years (from age 8 to age 11, but quite possibly more) in an Artichoke mind control "cult" that owned its own hospital? (Most of the kids the "cult" took in had bleached and dyed platinum hair, like the Children of the Damned, and Assange still had that very same hair when he turned himself in, though the roots are said to be growing out brunette now.)

Improbabilities do not add up, they multiply. the chances of a coin turning up heads in one throw are 1 in 2. The chances of turning up all heads in ten throws is not 1 in 11, but 1 in 2¹º (1 in 1024). Why did John Young of Cryptome.org send Assange away, claiming he was a spook? It doesn't add up, but rather divides down.

So what are my fallacies? We have no smoking gun, but we have the non-smoking gun, with Assange standing over the victims. Is this guy going to be your hero - your Batman? Are we expected to be suckers? Didn't we learn anything from Obama?

by: blues @ Wed Dec 15, 2010 at 22:24:11 PM UTC
[ Parent ]

A=B and B=C, therefore A=D. (0.00 / 0)

The classic conspiracy theories involve drawing false and predetermined conclusions from sets of intentionally arranged facts that don't add up logically to the conclusion (that there is a conspiracy).

Con artists use the same methodology to swindle people.

I'm not proclaiming Assange to be a hero at all. I'm debunking that mythology, but not by creating a countervailing mythology, as you are.

He is not the Jesus Christ of the Fake Left.

He is the Hugh Hefner of the fake Left.

All you are really saying is that it is possible that Assange and Manning are CIA and its also possible that they are not.

You are not making assessment based on probability you are basing it on belief.

Conspiracy, con artistry and religion all require similar bases of belief over probability.

by: donkeytale @ Thu Dec 16, 2010 at 03:49:24 AM UTC
[ Parent ]

Your Brain Is Short Circuited (5.00 / 2)

You should stop trying to think, donkeytale. You're just no good at it. For example, I never said that this Manning guy was involved in any intentional deception (that he "is CIA"). Not at all. Most likely he is not deliberately a party to any deception at all. When did I say such a thing? What I said was that it is absurd to think that he could have just downloaded hundreds of thousands of secret pages. When the Conspiracy pulls a psyop, you are not ever going to see a smoking gun. Instead, you may see a string of impossibilities and extreme oddities. You are unlikely to be able to prove anything at all. Who knows exactly how all that data popped up on his laptop? Somebody somewhere made it so. Who knows if the "cables" are even real?

As far a Assange is concerned, it's foolish to ponder whether someone "is" or "is not" "CIA." How many people do you know (except possibly yourself) have spent years of their childhood in an Artichoke mind alteration cult that bleaches and dyes their subject's hair to a strange platinum color? How many men (except possibly yourself) do you know who have strange platinum hair? (It could get to be a fashion trend, and that will be very weird indeed.) All we know is that he's very intelligent and almost certainly deranged. I don't know if he comprehends what he is involved in.

We have tons of impossibilities and extreme oddities. If you wanted to remain anonymous would you depend on Assange? (In your case - maybe.) And most of the "leaks" support notions that are favorable to the Conspiracy. Yeah, there was the little worm on the hook movie of kids being shot from a helicopter - which was not really that shocking in the context of what we already know.

I refuse to become all righteous about the persecution of this insane puppet. I really just feel sorry about his past. And what is all this "left" nonsense. I reject the delusions of those who suppose themselves to be "left," "right," or whatever. I think for myself. I refuse to make heroes of lunatics like Julian Assange, Glenn Beck, and so on.

Wikileaks shows every sign, with its oddities and impossibilities, of being a psyop, even though most of its participants may not be aware of that. Fools make the world go 'round. by: blues @ Thu Dec 16, 2010 at 09:59:10 AM UTC
[ Parent ]

Rated holy (2.00 / 1)

because your schtick is full of holes.

by: donkeytale @ Thu Dec 16, 2010 at 14:17:18 PM UTC
[ Parent ]

Yours rated boring, Blues Holy too (5.00 / 1)

What got you into trouble donkeytale is your propensity to spam out of context posts across the dying soapblox dynasty.

What Blues wrote was pure genius for conspiracy theory entertainment. The mind control schtick is always good for a laugh and reveals Blues was paying attention at the LaRouche meetings.

Where Blues is wrong however is this. Assange was victimised by Project Asparagus. Project Artichoke was introduced by the OSS, the precursor to the CIA. Recently declassified documents acquired by The Onion through the FOIA show that Jean Harlow was actually born a brunette. The platinum blonde dye emitted a chemical inhaled by the agitators and various dirty faced actors who co-starred. Yes, Jean Harlow was CIA. I mean OSS. It's true, because it's here in print on the internet. If it wasn't true, there would be no mention of it.

Just think of how we know God is real because of the word God. That type of greatness must exist, or else the idea never would have emerged. There I said it. Carry on. That's the stuff. Bet on it. Wake the fock up everybody. Bagels and cream cheese for all. Peace on Earth a rum ba dum dee dah yeah hey now....



by: socrates @ Thu Dec 16, 2010 at 20:30:55 PM UTC
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Assange granted bail. (0.00 / 0)
Other items of interest:Continuing a pattern, Assange lawyer/public relations rep admits the rumours of a secret grand jury in the US pondering an indictment of Assange is "pure speculation."
A British citizen, Gary Mckinnon, who has admitted hacking into US govt. systems containing secret information, has been in Britain resisting extradition to the US for eight years, even after losing his appeal more than one year ago.
Swedish prosecutors state that any decision to extradite Assange from Sweden to a "non- EU " country would, by the rules of the EU, be decided by Britain.
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Still more of yesterday's donkeytale "perversely stupid moronity" becoming todays conventional wisdom: (0.00 / 0)
A House committee held its first hearing on the WikiLeaks controversy Thursday, but those on the panel focused mainly on the problem of government over-classification and how, if at all, Congress should revamp the Espionage Act rather than if WikiLeaks editor Julian Assange should face criminal prosecution.Geoffrey Stone, a professor at the University of Chicago Law School, kicked things off by saying that WikiLeaks-related legislation recently introduced by Sen. Joe Lieberman is clearly unconstitutional. The Shield Act would amend the Espionage Act and make it illegal to publish the names of military and intelligence informants, but Stone said that while it might be constitutional to apply that to government employees, applying it to private citizens would violate the First Amendment.
Manning, the govt employee, faces great danger.
Assange faces only the danger of media overexposure.
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Linky thingie: (0.00 / 0)
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More donkeytale prophecy fulfilled: Assange inks a 7 figure book deal according to the Guardian and of course a film deal will surely follow (0.00 / 0)
Grab a percentage of the gross, dude. Set for life.Hilariously, he claims in the same interview that he will be executed "jack Ruby style" if he is extradited to the US and sent to prison.
R-i-i-i-i-g-h-t.

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You heard it here first: casting the lead in the soon to be announced Julian Assange biopic: (0.00 / 0)
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